Posted
by
timothy
on Friday May 18, 2012 @09:39PM
from the any-color-as-long-as-it's-apple dept.

snydeq writes "With WWDC around the corner, iOS 6 rumors are taking center stage, but the real action for developers may be around iCloud. Forthcoming OS X Mountain Lion will integrate iCloud into the formal file system, making iCloud usage much easier and thus more common, and thanks to iCloud Documents, which lets apps open and save documents directly in iCloud, developers will be able to better tap iOS-to-OSX document syncing in their apps, a la iWork. But there is a downside to this opportunity: 'For developers, it further enmeshes you in the Apple ecosystem, almost in the way that America Online did in its heyday. Case in point: OS X apps can use the iCloud Documents APIs only if they are sold through the Mac App Store.'"

Apple doesn't want you to have a computer, they want you to have Apple devices where you buy stuff from Apple. They want you to sit around and consume the content they sell. They've been heading that direction for awhile now, this is just a continuation of it. It isn't likely to be too many more years before they lock it down entirely, and Macs are just large stations for accessing the Apple Store/iTunes.

Apple is all about the locked-in ecosystem where everything is their way, everything runs through them, and they get a cut of everything. This is just another step down that road.

Apple doesn't want you to have a computer, they want you to have Apple devices where you buy stuff from Apple. They want you to sit around and consume the content they sell. They've been heading that direction for awhile now, this is just a continuation of it. It isn't likely to be too many more years before they lock it down entirely, and Macs are just large stations for accessing the Apple Store/iTunes.

Apple is all about the locked-in ecosystem where everything is their way, everything runs through them, and they get a cut of everything. This is just another step down that road.

Apple wants you to buy hardware. All the content, apps, and the walled garden are a means to this end.

We are no longer meant to be active participants, but merely passive consumers. And the latest innovations, we're not even consumers, but rather the consumables.

Facebook, for example. Its users are not its customers. Its users are the product they are offering to its real customers. This disconnect from the natural relationship of buyer and seller is a trend that leads us to a not-so-great place. The reason that Facebook's users are not its customers, is because people don't have any money, so the only thing they have to offer to the marketplace is their personal information, their habits, their discussions, their personal communications.

How much would you pay to use a service like Facebook? And why do you not have the choice? The notion that advertising is the only way to monetize the Internet is either an example of just how unimaginative our economic overlords really are. And cowardly. Because if it were a traditional buyer-seller relationship, then they'd actually have to offer something of value. They'd have to answer questions, provide a product or service of actual value. But that's too hard. And too honest.

Apple is going this direction too. Its customers are becoming less and less the people who buy their products and more and more the people who use their products to sell stuff to those of us who have their products.

We will see an Mac desktop OS that only allows installation of software purchased not from, but through Apple. Count on it.

"Our product is growing vocal about certain issues. We can't have product dissenting from our views. Brainwash half and lock out the other half. Now excuse me while I take a sip of this delicious Coca Cola, whose every refreshing sip makes meetings go better."

The reason that Facebook's users are not its customers, is because people don't have any money, so the only thing they have to offer to the marketplace is their personal information, their habits, their discussions, their personal communications.

While this sounds very delicious in its sensationalism, the reason Facebook is free is the same reason all social media services are free -- you won't attract a critical mass of users if your service sits behind a paywall. People don't want to use a 'social' service in which their social circle has to pay in order to interact with each other.

This has nothing to do with people's ability to pay or not pay -- some community-driven pay-to-play sites seem to be profitable, e.g. eHarmony.com, Ancestry.com, Second Life. They aren't Facebook-level profitable, but they stay in business. The difference is that those social services are driven by discovery of new social contacts, not bringing your current circle over. And they offer features which people are willing to pay for. Sending messages, sharing photos, writing comments... these features are so ubiquitous now that they essentially have no intrinsic value, except for profile mining in the hands of unethical capitalists like the Facebook team.

Facebook is just a digital mirror of brick-and-mortar corporate conglomerates who offer seemingly much better value than local, customer-focused businesses. And people eat it up, thinking there's no downsides.

While I'm quite ardently against Apple's walled garden increasingly becoming a SuperMAX prison, at least customers are actually buying a product, and Apple's business goal is not selling your information. Their goal is selling hardware, and getting a cut out of every app store purchase. Apple just wants to keep you locked in, but I do believe MOST of the people who work there really are trying to make good products that help people. Every feature rollout on Facebook by contrast is another transparent attempt to get more data about your life.

"This signals the beginning of the end for something."
Common sense. This is similar to the feeding frenzy over Microsoft bundling Explorer. There's nothing that is forcing you to use it. I was far more upset about Apple bundling iTunes with Quicktime. I can't count the number of times I had to delete iTunes after installing Quicktime on Windows machines. This is a non story. Get back to me when they limit hard drive size and force you to use cloud storage. I'll be the first one to drop Mac.

Yes, sadly, we are this *holds up index finger & thumb, presses the two tightly together* close to finally segmenting Apple users from the rest of the technological universe; and when that is done, nothing of value will be lost.

Now if only we could convince them that they need Apple's latest invention, the iBrain, complete with 6PB of storage space (for all those memories you want to keep), and the iWallet (more of it 'Just Works,' now with automatic withdrawals to any vendor who can guess your pet's ni

Any way you slice it, this is unethical. Restricting usage of an API to developers who sell through your platform (and thus give you 30%), giving your own private cloud service filesystem level integration... Imagine if Microsoft made either of these moves.

Any way you slice it, this is unethical. Restricting usage of an API to developers who sell through your platform (and thus give you 30%), giving your own private cloud service filesystem level integration... Imagine if Microsoft made either of these moves.

Its about having apps screened and approved not about sales. Free apps (gratis) from the App Store can use iCloud for storage too.

Any way you slice it, this is unethical. Restricting usage of an API to developers who sell through your platform (and thus give you 30%), giving your own private cloud service filesystem level integration... Imagine if Microsoft made either of these moves.

Is it access to the API that Apple is restricting, or access to Apple's servers?

If it's the latter, then I don't see an issue... the server's are Apple's property, and so they can allow or deny access to their servers based on whatever terms they care to come up with.

OK. If you use an iOS device all your app comes through the Apple App store. So there is no change there. On Mac OS, 10.8 no one really knows what this OS is going to do. iCloud is fluid. For instance, MobileMe is shutting down in less than 45 days. I have not moved yet. Apple has however setup my mail so that I can use the mobileme interface. This was not something that was supposed to happen, but it did.

The point is that on Mac Apple is clearly going to pushing developers to use the App store, w

With both Snow Leopard and Lion, I had to hack a file just to enabled TRIM on my Intel SSD. I have a feeling I'll have to do that again if I upgrade. Unless they've made attempts to correct that little "exploit".

Apple makes a good product, but only if you buy everything through Apple. I'm quite honestly surprised they even made replacing an HDD with a non-Apple brand even possible. I know some IBM Thinkpads will bitch at POST unless the drive's firmware has been signed by IBM.

They want it to Just Work. They want to buy it, plug it in, go pointy-clicky and have it work. People have an expectation that computers and technological devices (tablets, phones, etc) work without screwing around with them.

Yes. In fact, we here this from the same crowd that used AOL (another walled garden). People who believe that ignorance is a strength.

Seriously, it takes less than a week of learning to know how to do 90% of the normal tasks with a computer. And yet these people are fighting it, for what reasons no one can figure out. Might as well as for a car with one button (no steering wheel, no pedals, no dials).

But it takes a year to learn what to do if anything goes wrong in even the slightest way. I've ended up as the family tech-support - I long ago lost count of how many times I have been summoned because 'the internet is down' only to discover Mother had knocked the wireless on/off button or put the browser into offline mode, and we went through a Week of Hell when some wannabe hacker tried to break into her email account and triggered gmail's automatic lockout.

Dude, using a computer is like driving a car, or performing CPR, or riding a bicycle, or learning how to swim. You do it once, you get it over with, you move on with life.

Now, it's true that I do not know your family; I do not know what would prevent them from learning what is considered an essential skill to life (I struggle with my own family). However, I might offer that it's because of learned helplessness, that because you are always there, that they've never felt the need to learn.

Honestly, that's why I bought my first mac over 10 years ago. I wanted a Unix based laptop where all the hardware actually worked and since I've never really looked back. Why? Because for 10 years my macs have pretty much stayed out of my way and let me get work done. Which is something I've grown even more appreciative of as I've gotten older and want to spend time doing things other than messing with computers. Mac App Store, great, let's me know when app updates come out. Also guess what, I bought Cyberduck through the App store. I've used the program for years always meaning to donate, but that was a hassle through paypal since I don't link Paypal to my bank account. With the App store, it was one click and I was more than happy to give the cyberduck project money for their years of work. If updates for the apps I use on a regular basis it lets me know that an update is available with a pretty good overview of what changes have been made.

But not this. They are providing a free network support service to vendors that sell through their store. Seems obvious, ethical, and fair. Dropbox is better and simpler anyway because all apps can use it with no API; however Dropbox SELLS its service and gives it away for free as a loss leader.

While I would like it if it were open to everyone, it actually does make sense. Apple needs to pay for iCloud somehow, and making sure that developers don't get a free ride is the easiest way to do it.

Furthermore, this is old news. We've known this since Mountain Lion was announced.

The most recent version of SkyDrive just shows up as a folder on your PC. Any app can read and write files to it using normal filesystem APIs, and they get automatically synced. And, of course, said app doesn't have to be distributed through the Windows Store.

YOU are geeks / nerds / techies / whatever label you prefer. Apple does not even count you as part of their customer base.

Apple is selling the coolest tech for largest market segment. You buy an apple device and it JUST FUCKING WORKS out of the box. and like it or not that is what people want. They don't want to have to do what you love to do and they HATE doing.

They want a device that just does what they need to do, and like it or not apple devices do just that.

Excuse me if I find your anecdotal evidence lacking credibility. I have a large number of Mac where I work and they are abused quite regularly. I haven't had these problems you speak of. I do like the USB keyboards from Dell which I use in the server room. I have plenty of spares since the keyboards seem to outlast the Dell computers themselves.

I've had one almost-die, but that was due to spilling tea on it. I did discover that those Apple keyboards (at least the wireless ones) are really very hard to repair. Those keycaps do not come off without a fight.

I do agree with you that the motherboards are fabricated by the same people who make the motherboards for Dell and others. However, the motherboards are made to Apple's specifications just like Dell specifies their motherboard designs. I also agree that the individual components are manufactured by third-party vendors that sell to just about everybody.

The key difference between the brands is that Apple wants quality to be associated with their branding and will make design choices and parts selections that

There are people I know personally that I am willing to bet the contents of my 401K that are WAY smarter then you are and they could give a shit less about repairing, hacking, or twiddling with the i[whatever] because that is not their interest.

Just because you get a woody playing with hardware like it was a blow up doll, does not mean the rest of the world does.

Now go sit in your mothers basement and have a great big huge glass of shut the fuck up.

Poor windows support? I'm running Windows 7 Pro (Bootcamp partition) and OSX right now via Parallels seamlessly at the moment. I do my android development on the windows side of the house as well as some work in Visual Studio. Sure, if I have to build something large I'll boot into windows, but for most of I work I can run Windows throughout he virtual machine just fine. Furthermore I can travel with just my laptop and do my work from anywhere I have an internet connection (which with my mobile hotspot is pretty much anywhere I have a cell signal).

And restrictive about getting things on a box? Okay a couple times I've had to create ACC versions of MP3's for whatever reason. Usually took less than 5 minutes for iTunes to do the conversions and whatever song I wanted was on the iDevice of my choice. Mostly though, any of the music I want to buy is already on iTunes and for $1.29 a song I get what I want. Click buy once and it automatically syncs and downloads to my iPhone, Mac Book Pro, iMac, and iPad. I've sat and watch it do it to all 4 devices at the same time.

I have no problems connecting to other macs or PC's on my home network. OSX seems to find my HP windows 7 box as well as my FreeBSD file server without any problems.

The bad thing here is not the use of iCloud as such. It's that the restrictions that come with it tie you in to their ecosystem in other, carefully engineered ways. In this case, once your document is there, you have to get your apps only from Apple sources (iOS/Mac App Store) for them to have access to it.

"Don't lay this on Tim Cook. This was Steve Jobs's plan; Tim is just carrying on with it."

It doesn't matter whose idea it was. It is still a bad idea. They are making exactly the same mistakes that Microsoft did, for the same reasons Microsoft made them, and from which Microsoft has not, to this day, recovered.

Cook or Jobs, either one should know better. I could see this coming from a mile away, and they have had plenty of warning. If Apple keeps this up, the results will not be good for them.

Sorry, but the Tech Bubble was over 10 years ago. Nobody in their right mind buys stock at 100 times price/earnings ratio, unless they expect the company to grow, very fast.

The problem is: Facebook can't grow very fast. They probably have near their peak audience right now, considering that more and more people are getting fed up with them and their corporate "me first" policies.

A huge opening-day pop is not a sign of a successful I.P.O., but rather a massively mispriced one. Bankers are rewarding their friends and themselves instead of doing their fiduciary duty to their clients.

Car analogy: If your IPO shoots up a lot, it's like you PAYING someone to list your car for sale at a good price, but instead they under-price it, their close friends buy it and immediately sell it for twice the price.

Actually this is false, as many publications have shown... repeatedly, time after time.

Mac products tend to be a little -- but only a little -- more expensive that other systems given the same hardware.

Apple tends to choose, in general, premium hardware for its products.

But magazine after magazine, and group after group, who have actually measured hardware quality and performance per dollar, have for many years now saying that Macs are just a little more expensive. And of course that doesn't accoun

This is untrue. They have been increasing their marketshare in computers for the past 6 or so years consecutively, in an industry that is stagnating in growth or even shrinking in some years. In the smartphone arena their marketshare is pretty stagnant, but their real-world numbers are increasing (the size of the market is growing, but their new users are cancelling out that proportional change). They are currently trading share back and forth with all other Android handset ma

Yeah, because it really sucks if when your machine gets stolen, you're able to get all your apps and your files back from a server in North Carolina or Oregon. Seriously, doesn't Apple know that people enjoy the hassle of losing data? WTF are they THINKING?

"I love my MacBook Pro; but I fear that in another generation or two I'm going to have to give them up because I don't like where Apple is taking their OS."

Yes, exactly! And when I seem them making the same kind of mistakes -- exactly the mistakes that drove me to OS X instead of Windows in the first place -- I have to wonder what the hell they're thinking. If they keep it up, everybody who is anybody will be on Linux.

The version of OS X that comes after Mountain Lion will only let you install applications/software from the App Store. Again, Steve's plan; not Tim's.

How is that supposed to work? Is Apple going to start selling OSX desktops and laptops that won't run scripts or executables?

You'll pardon me for thinking this is a pretty weak prediction. Here's an alternative: One day Apple will start selling iOS devices in the Macbook or iMac form factor. See how much better that is? If you also assume they'll kill OSX in the process, then you get your doom and gloom AND you don't have to explain how they'd actually go about locking down their OS to be so restricti

Now your splitting hairs. If you haven't noticed, there is a drive to make OS X more iOS-like. Let's see what happens after Mountain Lion, if it is iOS that they call the next release of OS X I am still right.:)

Here's my prediction, you are dead wrong.
"The version of OS X that comes after Mountain Lion will only let you install applications/software from the App Store."
More paranoia than reality. After spending better than a decade growing their OS and finally challenging Microsoft on the desktop front they shoot themselves in the foot by forcing all sales through the app store? They'd loose half their customers overnight. First off no one would upgrade to to Mountain Lion and most would hold off buying new equipment. Third party vendors would be shutout so the backlash would be epic. It may be a wet dream over at Apple but no one is that monumentally stupid. The number of pissed off customers would dwarf the Vista revolt. Why lock the barn door while more are trying to squeeze in? There's simply no rational reason to do it and there are major downsides. Sure they will keep trying to make it or attractive to use the app store but shutting out other vendors would be shooting themselves in the foot with a nuke. They'd also be putting an antitrust target on their chests so any gain would be offset by customer backlash and the next ten years in court.

The way I see this is going, this might be the case by default. Typical users get their software through Apple. Controls the user experience by denying applications they don't want for their users for whatever reason. On the upside users get safer downloads and applications with at least some level of quality. The fact that applications are being sandboxed and what they can do are controlled by "entitlements" given by Apple will eventually increase the security of OS X. Too long has the access rights of a

Because it greatly reduces the utility of the device. If Apple controls the whitelist, there are things that Apple won't let you do because it would be incompatible with maximising their profits. For example, they do not permit emulators in the app store. They also do not permit anything that duplicates a function already present in iOS, which is clearly bad for competition. If you want a voice interface, it's Siri or nothing.

You're posting nonsense. MacOS X Server is well and a live. They killed the XServe hardware which sold only about 300,000 units a year from what I heard. They are selling the Mac Mini Server, and MacOS X Server will run just fine on any Mac Pro. X11 support is available, and Apple tells you were to get it.

This is patently false. Apple is no longer supporting X11, but they are recommending that people install an open source X11 for OS X called XQuartz. So, you will be able to run X11 apps in Mountain Lion.

You have to use iCloud if you want to compete apps which have iPad versions that can open their documents from the cloud.

In other words, it's classic tie-in - using their dominance on the tablet market to get developers in line on the desktop. To remind, from June 1 onward, all apps sold in the Mac App Store have to be sandboxed - in other words, it becomes a full-fledged walled garden, just like iOS.

iCloud is free to use, so however Apple chooses to implement it is their business.

App sandboxing is for security - not sure why you're trying to spin that as a negative, although it has already had some potential casualties (like apps that listen for specific keyboard shortcuts globally and perform actions while in the background).

And why would they be trying to get developers "in line" on the desktop? If they're already developing apps on the store then they now have th

iCloud is free to use, so however Apple chooses to implement it is their business.

That would be true even if it weren't free. Their service, their rules. Doesn't mean I can't say that the rules are nasty.

App sandboxing is for security - not sure why you're trying to spin that as a negative, although it has already had some potential casualties (like apps that listen for specific keyboard shortcuts globally and perform actions while in the background).

I don't mind app sandboxing as such, so long as it's something that's not shoved on either the user or on developer. In this case, Apple forces the hands of developers who might have preferred to distribute their apps outside of the app store (e.g. because they need certain features not available in the sandbox), but now have to also consider the fact that not going for sandbox means tha

From the perspective of someone developing for iOS but with as much separation between their crap (APIs) and mine as I can get, this doesn't change things a whole lot, really. Apple has always loved getting people enmeshed in their APIs, it's just that in many cases they hadn't had the clout to do it until the past few years. Best as I can do, there's still a bunch of weed roots snuck into more and more of my own classes. It's so bad that when I see they've added new functionality I'm now extremely

Maybe it will have that sort of function in the future, but Apple have tried that before with iDisk and it was a failure, so I expect it will simply continue to work as it does now - as a system that links your apps together so you don't have to worry about the filesystem. This is obviously not aimed at power users.

I know - don't feed the trolls. But this is utter BS. "While limited" - how? On my MacBook Pro, I can run the suite of Office tools; I can compile and run common X11 apps; I can even connect serial devices and do bit-level twiddling if I want. I can open a shell and run bash or ksh scripts until the cows come home. I can edit HD video and multi-track audio. So, how am I limited by using Mac OS?

And then implying that all nerds must be SM freaks - referring to the configuration contortions that Linux users often have to go through to get just about anything to work? - is just ridiculous. Because, surely, any self-respecting nerd would rather fuck around trying to get drivers to work for some video card or printer rather than just do some actual work. Seriously? Ok, maybe things are better, now, with Linux; I wouldn't know - I stopped banging my head on the table some years ago, and bought a Mac. Now? I just focus on what I need to do rather than what configuration file I need to play with to get X11 up and running.

Maybe you just don't understand that some of us have more important things to do than mine, refine and then cast the materials needed for every metal and plastic piece of the mobo, then solder them by hand, one eye blindfolded, left handed, if you're normally right handed, to be considered a "true nerd." Maybe an abacus would make you feel more manly. Knock yourself out. I'll just put my formula into a spreadsheet, get my results to my boss, and then move on to the next assignment.

In other words: I can get down and dirty with a Mac, if I need to. Most of the time, I don't need to. I'm cool with that. You keep punching those bit codes into your Altair, though; we're all real impressed.

Hardware support for one. Not even talking about computers, if you plug in a random pcie card to a mac pro what are the odds of success? on linux it tends to be a case of "has the chipset been out for more than 3-6 months"

You are also limited in the updates you receive, I have a g4 mac I'm quite fond of and it can still function using a 3.3 kernel and the latest of packages (with a lightweight DE of course). Mac os X support died for it quite some time ago.

I should follow your advice and not "feed the trolls" (i.e., you). Oh well. Oddly, your post is considered "insightful," so I will respond.

Ok, maybe things are better, now, with Linux; I wouldn't know - I stopped banging my head on the table some years ago, and bought a Mac. Now? I just focus on what I need to do rather than what configuration file I need to play with to get X11 up and running.

So your blistering critique of Linux (and Linux users) is based on what, exactly? You admit you "wouldn't know" what using Linux is like. Yet you seem absolutely confident that you are far better off using Apple's software.

I do like the way you state this, though: "Now? I just focus on what I need to do..." That summarizes quite nicely why I use Linux most of the

Why would it be difficult? They can do it in exact same way they did it on iOS, which, after all, is also Darwin-based.

I meant difficult not as in "difficult to implement" but difficult to fit into their whole OS ecosystem. Apple would have to shut down their server flavor, they would have to ditch terminal completely, they'd disable PHP, Apache, X11. They would have to make their OS incompatible with any programming environments as Python, Perl, revision control systems... Finder probably would have to go away (or just be re-implemented so that it can't go into unprotected territories). Their root handling would have to be